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59
been in contact with small-pox, and it seemed probable that, if
the facts could be ascertained, a similar explanation would have
been forthcoming in respect of the remainder. In the next
fortnight, ending February 5, there was a "notable outburst" of
small-pox, the number of cases in the three parishes going at a
bound, from 7 in the preceding fortnight, to 62. Of this
number 47 occurred in the "special area." Forty-two persons
were attacked in five days, January 26-30, including 32 in the
special area. Evidence was got, or reasonable suspicion could
be entertained, in nine cases out of the 32, that the sufferers had
been in personal relation, direct or indirect, with small-pox: in
respect of the remaining 23 persons, "there was scarcely a
hint to be got to account for their illness." Mr. Power lays
great stress on the atmospheric conditions, characterising the
five days (January 13-17) on which these 32 persons must have
become infected, to wit: "severe frost, still, sometimes foggy,
weather, occasional light airs from nearly all points of the
compass, and absenceof ozone in the atmosphere at Greenwich."*
These conditions came to an end by a notable snow-fall on
January 18, accompanied by a heavy gale from E.N.E.
The effect of these conditions, Mr. Powers states, was to produce
"opportunities of a remarkable kind, not for the removal of
matters contained in the air, but for the quiet dissemination of
matters contained in the air, and for the deposit, perhaps, of
any that were particulate.'' The incidence of small-pox, he
adds, was almost the same in all directions from the hospital
as a centre, but the intensity (measured by the percentage of
houses invaded) was proportioned to the nearness of the
houses to the hospital. In these days, he adds, "an increasing
number of acute cases of small-pox being received at the
hospital, was charging the air of the hospital with abundance
*Some years ago Dra. Tripe and Burge, the Medical Officers of Health for
Hackney and Fulham respectively, male simultaneous observations with regard
to ozone, and found that when ozone was present in the air at the east end of
London it was absent at the west end, and vice versa. The presence of ozone at
Fulham, therefore, is made more probable by the recorded absence of ozone
at Greenwich.